12/27/11

If you're like me you hate waiting for the butter to come to room temp to make chocolate chip cookies. You want them now, not in a few hours because by then the craving for the cookies will be gone--well, maybe for some of you.
So you turn to the melted butter version of chocolate chip cookies and turns out they always turn out to be flat: thin and crispy. Which is fine, but I don't always like thin & crispy. I lean more towards the side of thick and chewy with a nice crisp outside.
After a few experiments using a basic cookie recipe from america's test kitchen or cooks county whatever they call themselves today--I found a good one using melted butter that resulted in giant, thick, crispy on the outside, chewy on the inside chocolate chip cookies. It's really all about the right ratio of baking powder to flour to salt and butter. haha. But all that does make a difference if you break it down. Less flour less chewy, more butter more crisp/flakiness, and of course using good quality chocolate helps too as well as using the right kind of chocolate. If you used milk chocolate the cookie might be too sweet, so using a bittersweet won't overpower the chocolate thus making the dough flavor shine through. You all know this already..... just get to the cookie recipe already!

Use an ice cream scooper for all cookie doughs. Makes the cookies nice and round and even. Use any size really, just watch the baking times if you use smaller scoops.

Baking times matter! Of course this is dependent on various ovens, but keep an eye on your cookies after the 10 minute mark. They burn up fast.

Cook notes: make sure to let the melted butter cool a bit (about 15 minutes before using). When you are ready to use the butter give it a good stir to incorporate the butter solids and fats back together.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line about 4 cookie sheets with parchment paper. I found that using milk chocolate chips were just too sweet with this dough. Using bittersweet or semi was just right. Always make sure your baking soda and baking powder are fresh; when they go stale they result in thin tasteless cookies. I love to use ice cream scoopers to make the perfect, round size cookies. I adore large cookies so I used a regular sized ice cream scoop. If you want smaller size cookies, use a smaller ice cream scoop but remember to reduce the baking time a few less minutes!

Whisk all the dry ingredients together; set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, either by hand or using a mixer (I don’t have a mixer so I did this by hand) mix butter & sugars until thoroughly combined. Add in the egg and egg yolk and vanilla extract, mix well. Then add in the dry mixture, mix until just combined, do not overmix. Next FOLD in the chocolate chips (if you want to add in nuts go ahead—about 1 cup).

Using an ice cream scoop, and making sure to compact the dough in the scooper as much as possible, scoop out on baking sheets about 1 & ½ inches apart.
Bake about 11-14 minutes, rotating pans halfway through. You’ll know the cookies are done by light golden brown edges and slightly puffy middles. As soon as they turn golden brown, in a matter of minutes they turn dark, so take them out, plus they do continue to bake once out of the oven. Don’t try and take them off the cookie sheets, they will just break. Should make about 15-18 large, if using a smaller scoop then you’ll have a few more.

I've wanted to investigate how to make the perfect chocolate chip cookie for some time now. I love that you took time to photograph the times baked. I need some chocolate chip cookies in my life, like today!!

about vanilla sugar blog

Unique eats, creative recipes, as simple as possible.What drives me to create? Seeing dishes in restaurants, meals created on TV, recipes in cookbooks/online, and I always think to myself why didn’t they add this or why did they leave out that? Love to question, love to research, and love to learn about combining different flavors and textures in recipes.Recipe creations please email: vanillasugarblog@aol.com